"The central doctrine of Christianity, then, is not that God is a bastard. It is, in the words of the late Dominican theologian Herbert McCabe, that if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you."--Terry Eagleton

"It is impossible for me to say in my book one word about all that music has meant in my life. How then can I hope to be understood?--Ludwig Wittgenstein

“The opposite of poverty is not wealth; the opposite of poverty is justice."--Bryan Stevenson

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

"Reversing an effort to restore Christianity"

"Loosen up your suspenders, hunker down on on the ground...."

Per Thought Criminal, who provides a video of Noam Chomsky talking about the effects of Vatican II and the "preferential option for the poor". Interesting in itself, and provides some context to the pig squeals of FoxNews and Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin in response to Pope Francis's Evangelii Gaudium. And that we didn't take this as seriously as we did Vatican II.

Maybe because it's only words, and Vatican II represented a change in behavior. Or maybe it's because it affected South America, and not southern America. Or maybe it's because the radical bishops Chomsky mentions will have to re-emerge under Francis.

All I know is, even LBJ visited the poor in Appalachia. I don't think I could find a picture of a President since in the same situation. And we've become quite comfortable, since my youth (I'd have been the age of these boys in the picture) with cliches.

As Chomsky says: "Keep away from cliches; the world's much more complicated."